Kylie's First Letter 9/5/11

Hey you guuuuys!!! So I just like saying that because I can no longer refer to anyone like that here at the MTC. That is actually a hard habit to break. So I've sent letters to everyone today. Mondays are my P-days and because today is labor day everything we planned on kind of fell through. We woke up early to go to the temple this morning and found out it was closed, as well as the bookstore and everything else so we couldn't buy laundry detergent, notebooks, and whatever else we were planning on buying today. So bummer....BUT I hope you all are enjoying the day off! Too bad there isn't any snow...huh dad :) So I made it through Sunday. Everyone just kept telling me make it to Sunday. And now I know why. the first few days were a little rough, as I realized how hard learning a language really is. knowing Spanish is almost a hindrance, but it does come in handy when I guess a word and it is super similar to the Portuguese language. They have a new teaching system here that is pretty weird. Its basically self guided study. But with a huge emphasis on studying the scriptures. So for my first week I started freaking out and using all of my personal study time for language study. I soon came to realize this is not so. Personal study time is for studying the scriptures and language study is for studying the language. We have one hundred bajillino hours for personal study time and only 1 hour of language study time. No joke. After Sunday church, and several devotionals I came to accept and really believe in this concept. It is all about the message and the spirit we teach it then. The spirit is key. Seek the truth, knowledge, and spirit first and language comes second. So I decided to leave it all up to the Lord. I would do my best and follow the rules with exact obedience (I'm really starting to get sick of hearing about obedience) and leave the rest up to the Lord. If the Lord decides not to bless me with the gift of tongues, it will not be my lack of effort of lack of obedience, it will be His fault. So we will see how this week goes with my language speaking abilities. So basically, I'm just patiently waiting for a miracle. I'll be honest though those first few days were really tough, I wished that I had been called Spanish or English speaking because it would have been 10 million times easier. But I know the Lord has put me here for a reason and I will tough it out with a grin on my face (even if I am gritting my teeth the whole time). My teacher Brother Shceffer told us a story from his mission how he bore his testimony and the investigator began crying and when he finished she said "that was beautiful, what did he say?" So It really is all about the spirit. I feel like I have been here foooooooooorrrrrrrrrrrrrrrreeeeeeeeeeevvvvvvvvvvvvvvveeeeeeeeeeerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. These are going to be a long 8 weeks. I feel like I was born here. The only thing that helps me remember that I've been here for less than a week is this silly campus. It is soooo confusing. All of the buildings look exactly the same, and the buildings are tall enough I can't see the mountains so I get disoriented very easily. Luckily I have to great companions that I just follow along. I just wish they would paint the buildings a different color or something. My companions are Sister Connell and Sister Hall. Sister Connell is from Washington and is a premed major at BYU. Sister Hall is a nursing major from Arizona, and we took several classes together - we didn't know it at the time, but we did. They are both so sweet and I love them very much. They both speak portuguese which was really hard for me in several ways. 1) I feel like an idiot all the time 2) They almost handicap me because when they teach the lessons I just let them go because I can't really say anything. But I guess I better get use to this because that is how it will be for the rest of the mission.... if I make it to Brazil. The last district sent 14 elders to Houston Texas to wait for visas, please remember to pray for our visas!!! I love my district. The elders are sooo funny they keep us laughing. I'll try to send some pictures home, I was planning to today but everything is closed. So a lot of this will be repeat if you get my snail mail, but hey I thought I would use my half an hour. I wanted to thank everyone for all the notes that I keep finding everywhere. You are all so sweet and I love you oh so much, I know this is silly to say but I can't wait to see you again in another year and a half. I'm not homesick yet, I would call it more sick of studying and sitting inside alllllllll day long. Both my companions don't really enjoy running and I need to run. I think I'm addicted or something. If I don't get to do some type of aerobic activity here soon I'll die. All of my gym times are right of meals which stinks! But whatever. So the whole sleeping schedule is working great. I'm exhausted at 10:00 but I ususally wake up at around 6 because my body is not used to sleeping that long. Oh and Dani - I'm using the Justin Bieber notebook for my vocab notebook. Haha - I love it. Life is good and I hope life beyond the fence is treating you all well. I hope school is stressing anyone out too much. And remember to look for my letters in the mail they should be coming soooon :) Love you all muito! - that is the one word I have learned in Portuguese. Just kidding, I can kind of pray and kind of bear my testimony. One elder calls is cave man speaking. You pray - me know God listen....etc. Even though it is caveman English it is amazing to feel their spirit. Some of these missionaries are just so adorable. I love them all! K - two more minutes, hope this gets to someone. Love you all. Sister P That was a way long email so sorry - I just had nothing to read so I spent the whole time writing.....